


This Hate of Mine

by Fudgyokra



Category: Batman (Comics), Batman - All Media Types
Genre: Anal Sex, Angst and Porn, Caretaking, Dead Dove: Do Not Eat, Derogatory Language, Dirty Talk, Gang Rape, Humiliation, Hurt/Comfort, Jason Todd is Robin, Loss of Virginity, M/M, Non-Consensual Oral Sex, Painful Sex, Police Officer Dick Grayson, Protective Dick Grayson, Rape Aftermath, Rescue, Sloppy Seconds, dick doesn't actually kill anyone but boy does he want to
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-19
Updated: 2019-02-25
Packaged: 2019-08-25 08:40:19
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con, Underage
Chapters: 2
Words: 9,368
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16657816
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fudgyokra/pseuds/Fudgyokra
Summary: Over the years, Dick had been asked a thousand times what it would take for him to break his code.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [dedesan](https://archiveofourown.org/users/dedesan/gifts).



> Step 1: Make nifty friend on Tumblr dot com. Step 2: Spitball nasty fic ideas back and forth until it becomes something off which I cannot keep my filthy hands. Step 3: Profit.
> 
> Please mind the tagged warnings!

When Jason begged Dick to take him on a trip to Blüdhaven, he hadn’t expected to be denied. He’d pulled out all the stops, too: Puppy eyes, doting, even outright whining. None of them worked, which flabbergasted him since Dick was always willing to give him what he asked for, even if sometimes it was only to spite Bruce. That’s why he thought this was going to _work_ , because the whole crux of his argument was that the man was overstepping his boundaries, being far too controlling—points of familiarity for Dick.

But here he was, shaking his head and ruffling Jason’s hair with an apologetic smile like the complaints meant nothing to him. Irritated, Jason swatted the affectionate hand away. “Why not?” he probed. “I’m sick of staying here listening to him bitch.”

“Language, brat,” Dick chided without conviction. “It’s not that I wouldn’t like to take you there, in theory, but…well, Blüdhaven’s not exactly a safe city, Little Wing.”

Jason curled his lips in an expression he was loath to call a pout. “I grew up on the streets of Gotham. I fight crime beside the Batman! I know what I’m doing, and I can take care of myself!”

“It’s worse than Gotham,” Dick tried, but Jason saw where he was going with that and decidedly employed his last-resort tactic, which he liked to call “Operation: Hardest of Hearts.”

He turned his head away, crossed his thin arms over chest, and lifted one hand in a dismissive wave. “Fine. I’ll just go back out on the streets. Look for some fun on my own. I know every alley in this city like the back of my hand, after all. Spend enough time there and you learn to catch up real quick-like.”

Sure enough, Dick’s brows furrowed, and he reached out to lay a hand on Jason’s shoulder. The touch made him smile, so he was thankful his face was turned the other direction. “Jay, don’t you dare. You could get killed, or kidnapped, or…”

“What’s it to you? You want me to stay here with Mister ‘I’m Right About Everything.’ I’d be better off with my _real_ friends.”

Dick fell for that trap, too. “‘Real friends’?”

“You know, the gargoyles. They treat me nicer than anyone else does, ‘cept you. Even if you’re being a total jerk to me right now.” He did feel at least a little bad for the way Dick retracted his hand as if he’d been burned but reasoned that it _was_ what happened when you played with fire.

“Okay,” Dick finally relented, tacking on a defeated sigh. “Fine, I’ll take you with me when I leave.”

“Yes!” Jason cheered. He twisted around in his seat and launched himself at the other in a crushing embrace.

Dick accepted it with a laugh, petting a hand over his hair that made him melt inside. “You really are a brat.”

“I promise I’ll stay safe,” he offered.

Dick’s smile faltered for a split second. “Just don’t leave the house without me, all right? And you have to come out on patrol, so I can protect you.”

Jason resisted the urge to roll his eyes. “Fine,” he said. It was whole-heartedly a lie.

//

He really had underestimated what he’d be getting into. Despite Dick’s warnings, Jason was of the opinion he would be able to handle the slums of Blüdhaven as well as he could the slums of Gotham. Well, the slums of Gotham sure didn’t have gangs parading around when the sun was still shining.

In his confidence, he’d neglected to bring his tool kit from the apartment, which was a choice he was beginning to regret, especially when he found himself face-to-face with a man more than twice his height, who gripped him by the shoulder as if Jason were an old friend instead of a perfect stranger. Then suddenly he was being steered into an empty alley, where he was flanked by four men of equally intimidating size to the first, two on each wall.

A cold weight formed in the pit of his stomach. “Hands off,” he snapped with as much ire as he could muster.

The first man—presumably the gang’s leader—didn’t miss a beat. “Shut up,” he said, “and get down on your knees.”

Jason’s heart thumped behind his ribs. He had no costume, henceforth no gear, and fighting back against five people of their musculature was a no-go. Escape was his only option, so he took off in a mad dash for the exit, only to be seized by more than one set of hands on his way out.

The leader tsk-ed. “A runner, how unfortunate. I pegged you as the ‘Please, I’ll do anything you want!’ type.”

“Don’t,” Jason said in what he hoped was a threatening way. “I have a knife.”

Spoken in mock surprise, the response was: “Oh, you have a knife. Hear that, boys? He has a knife! I guess we ought to leave him alone, then.”

The men snickered. Jason tensed when a blade suddenly nicked his cheek, directing his attention to one of the scragglier of them. “Guess what?” an unfriendly, raspy voice sneered. “I have a knife, too.”

He kicked the man hard in the shin, earning a yelp for his efforts before the one in charge dragged him back against his chest and twisted his arms behind him. It would’ve made him wince, had another hand not risen to grip his jaw tightly enough to bruise. “Why don’t you tell him you’re sorry, baby? I mean, surely he didn’t deserve that.”

“Rot in hell!” he cried. That was the wrong answer. Before he could blink, they were all crowded around him, pushing him further into the leader’s chest, where he had him held in a vice-like grip.

The first pair of wandering hands landed on his shirt, yanking violently at his collar until the threads popped and tore under the stress. Blunt nails scratched angry paths down his torso, pulling a frustrated sound from his lips before he could stop it.

“You like that, huh, kid?”

He knew it was meant solely to elicit a reaction but fell for it all the same, shouting an angry, scandalized, “No!”

Terror didn’t have time to dawn on him when another pair of hands yanked open his fly and wrestled his shorts down, tugging the undergarments with them. All he felt was shock, illustrated by his gasp and kicking feet, each of which were grabbed by the ankle before they could land any harmful blows. He was being drawn forcefully out of his clothes in a process that even succeeded in yanking one of his shoes off, leaving him naked in the alley. It hurt more that way, when his hands and bare knees hit the asphalt, but he knew better than to make a sound. That would do nothing but egg them on.

He tried to crawl away, only to be dragged back and have his hips forcefully propped up like he was some kind of show dog. Though it sent a hot flash of humiliation through his body, he found there was nothing to do about it when his cheeks were crudely spread with calloused thumbs, and the pure indignation made him freeze completely.

“Haven’t seen you in these parts before,” one of them said, just as someone else’s finger, colder than the ones holding him open, began to press at his hole. Instinctively, he tensed, which was met with a snort. “Think I’d remember someone so pretty and small.”

“I didn’t think there were any tight-asses left in ‘Haven,” another of them joked, ushering the group into more laughter.

Jason felt sense come back to him when the cold finger tried to breach him, and he kicked out his leg, this time striking something fruitful, if the shouted curse meant anything. It gave him the adrenaline rush he needed to start struggling again, although it did little good when someone’s shins came down over his calves, trapping him against the ground with weight alone.

Fear finally settled in. “Stop!” he yelled, aiming a fist at the man who stepped into his field of vision, only to have his wrist grabbed halfway through the punch. The leader again. His free hand popped open the button of his jeans, slid the zipper down, and Jason watched with wide eyes as a dripping erection sprung out from above the lowered waistband and pressed toward his face. He bent the arm holding his weight in an attempt to duck away, but the man yanked on his wrist and pulled him back up, sliding the cockhead over his cheek, leaving a sticky stripe of pre-cum in its wake.

Visceral disgust hit him so quickly he made the mistake of closing his eyes when he sneered. “Get off,” he grunted.

“Oh, I plan to.” A fresh peal of cruel laughter arose. Jason’s eyes shot open when fingers crooked into the corner of his mouth, pulling at his cheek from the inside. He turned his head and bit down. The fingers left, returning as an open-palmed slap to the face, delivered with such strength it momentarily blurred his vision.

Behind him, the man sitting on his legs offered a slap of his own, which cracked across the sensitive skin of Jason’s ass with a noise that made him jerk forward, inadvertently rubbing his cheek against the organ still looming threateningly in front of him another time. When he groaned in distaste, the thugs took it as encouragement. More than anything, he wanted to will his body not to react, but the sounds kept coming. Worse still, when someone’s hand reached underneath him to grope, he felt his cock twitch despite the fear racing through his veins.

“Oh, shit, he _does_ like it,” someone said with a kind of appreciation that made Jason’s face burn hot. He tried to grate out a denial, but when his lips parted all that came out at first was a shout of surprise from the sudden damp heat pushing against him from behind.

By the time he was able to form words again, they all sounded pitiful. “No! Please, don’t! I haven’t—I would never—not like _this,_ please!”

“What, a pretty boy like you is a virgin? I don’t buy it,” the leader said with a predatory grin.

Jason only squirmed and breathed in noisy breaths, refusing to respond until the tip of the stranger’s cock started opening him up. “No,” he repeated, voice cracking, “I’m a—it’s not supposed to be _you_.” He loathed how he sounded like a dumb, lovestruck kid, but he couldn’t help the thoughts that flickered through his head: A face he shouldn’t see, shouldn’t ever have allowed himself to fantasize about, especially not for so long it got to the point he’d deluded himself into thinking he was keeping this moment for _him._

“You won’t win us over with all that ‘saving it for someone special’ bullshit.” The words blurred into the background of his thoughts when the man behind him kept pushing, forcing him to take more until there was a shout of agony that didn’t even register to Jason as his own until a second later.

Through gritted teeth, he said, “You—you _freaks._ ”

The leader finally let go of his wrist in favor of grabbing a fistful of his hair, so he could jerk his head back. The strain lifted another reluctant groan from his throat. “Quit complaining. You want me first instead of him? I’m warning you, I’d be a lot rougher. But maybe that’s what you like?”

“No!” he sobbed.

“So, you want him first, then?”

“ _No_.”

“Pick one, or I’d be happy to pick for you.” Presently, he jerked himself a couple times in front of Jason’s face, and he watched as pre-cum drooled from the slit while the man got off on his torment. He imagined, without meaning to, how much worse it’d be to have _those_ hands digging into his hips, driving into him painfully, and sobbed again.

“Him,” he admitted, tears springing to his eyes.

“Good boy,” the leader said, letting go of his hair.

There was more laughter, but he barely registered it over the sting of the stranger rolling his hips, spearing the remaining length of his cock inside. “He’s tight. It’s almost no fun. Kinda uncomfortable.”

Jason sucked in a shaky breath and squeezed his eyes closed. Bastard, complaining about how _he_ hurt. He felt so filthy, being stretched open for the pleasure of these creeps. The shame was the worst part, at least until the man pulled back a couple inches and slammed back in, and the stab of pain overtook all other thoughts. He withdrew all the way on the next turn, then in with a violent slap of skin on skin, wrenching a scream from Jason’s throat that he couldn’t control. He tried to kick his legs, but all he accomplished was scraping his knees further on the rough terrain beneath them.

When an errant hand came to pet his hair, he swatted at it, succeeding in a light scratch but not much else. Then, suddenly, his own hand was grabbed and moved to the front of someone’s slacks. Beneath the fabric he felt his length, hard and hot, and swallowed a whimper at the dawning idea of what was going to happen to him here.

The leader grabbed his chin and pressed hard on the pressure points to force his jaw open, using his other hand to guide himself toward Jason’s mouth. “If you bite,” he said, voice dangerous, “I’ll let my men go two at a time.”

Jason’s next sob was cut off by the intrusion down his throat gagging him. With the threat in mind, he closed his eyes and focused on not puking or bearing down with his teeth.

The hand he had on the other man’s zipper trembled, but he slowly worked the fly open, earning a pleased hum. With some assistance, his fingers were wrapped around another length, and he made himself stroke along it, lest he be punished worse for disobeying.

It was difficult, though, when the man fucking him started a rhythm. His cock was raw and hot, scraping against Jason’s insides every time it forced back in, carving its way through tense muscle. Jason hadn’t even realized he’d been making noises around the intrusion in his mouth until it retracted with a lewd, wet pop and he gasped, cutting the next of the sounds short.

Abruptly, the other man in front dragged him by the hair onto his cock next, using him like a sleeve without regards to the tears now spilling freely down his face. Jason tried not to gag at the salty weight on his tongue, a new and fresh person to ruin him.

Someone groped aimlessly between his legs again. He didn’t know why, but it made his eyes flutter open so that he looked up at the man fucking his mouth. The leer he received made his stomach churn; he imagined how he looked, down on his knees, rocking back and forth with the roughness of each thrust. Eventually they became so hard he was forced further onto the man, and he had to close his eyes again.

It was a nightmare he couldn’t wake up from. Every few minutes, he would be dragged off by the hair onto the leader and then back again, so many times it was quick to make his jaw sore. Soon enough he was panting, saliva dripping down his chin in a way that made him feel even more violated, more debauched.

“Gonna cum,” the man behind him grunted, and Jason’s teary eyes shot open.

“No, no, no,” he begged, scratching first at the ground to try and get away, then behind him at the man’s thigh. “Not inside, please, no!”

He was ignored, and when he felt warm wetness pulse somewhere deep inside him, he bit down hard on his bottom lip to stop himself from bawling. It didn’t make much of a difference, because the man pulled out with a crude sound and high-fived another, who promptly settled behind him, between his legs this time. The relief at having his calves freed from their pin was short-lived, because then there was more stinging pain that came with being penetrated another time, and even though he could move his legs now, he didn’t even bother.

He saw the first man settle back on his haunches further up in the alley and light a cigarette. Hatred flowed through him like a tidal wave. The man grinned, took a drag, blew smoke.

Someone patted his cheek. “Come on, baby, focus. You got a job to do.”

His gaze settled on the man beside the leader, who held a hand out toward his buddy and received a cigarette as well. After it was lit, he pulled a breath, exhaling the smoke directly in Jason’s face.

He was about to get back to work when the new stranger dug his fingers into Jason’s hips and pulled him bodily back onto his cock like he weighed nothing, jabbing against something inside him in the process that made his mouth drop open around a wordless whimper. Each thrust pressed against the same spot and, in spite of everything, he subconsciously arched his back for more.

“Look at him,” a voice said, calling attention to his behavior. “He looks like he’s having a good time, eh?”

Jason’s face burned red up to his ears. He dropped his head in shame, only to have it tilted up by the chin, reminding him of his other engagements.

Even if it still hurt, was still causing tears to form in his eyes, the new stimulation made his own sex jump in interest when he took the leader back into his mouth, bobbing his head with the aid of an insistent hand on the back of his neck. He hated what he was doing, hated these men, hated himself, hated everything. Hated this wretched city.

His body was dragged back against another heavy thrust, making him moan and drool around the organ in his mouth. Everything about it was humiliating, but, just like before, the rush of cum flooding inside his abused hole made everything a hundred times worse. He felt filthy and used, guts aching with the force of being slammed into over and over, from all different angles while they took their turns inside him.

Another of the scumbags replaced the second, giving him just enough time to pull off their boss and take a breath before he fully sheathed himself with a single hard snap of the hips, stuffing Jason full to the sound of his own pathetic, hoarse scream.

This round, at least, was blessedly short, even if the man grunted lewdly throughout. He’d been so worked up that he was done in just a handful of thrusts, leaving only the head of his cock inside while he stroked himself to completion. It was shallow enough, then, that Jason could feel the disgusting sensation of cum leaking out, warm and wet, trickling down his thighs.

The last of the gangsters moved from in front of him to claim his place behind. He took his time, wore him out, so that once he started rocking into him with more direct force, Jason didn’t even make a noise beyond an exhausted moan. The thing that drew a far more genuine sound was a sudden burn on the cleft of his ass, and he realized with a sound of indignation that the bastard had extinguished his cigarette on him.

In front, the leader snorted a laugh and grabbed Jason’s hair as he jerked himself. “Keep your mouth open just like that, baby,” he crooned.

Stubbornly, Jason closed it, as if fighting now would do any good. His chin was seized, fingers used to pry his mouth open by the teeth before he was gagged again, just like the first time.

Right when he thought he might black out, the two strangers shuddered, one with an audible sound, as they neared climax. He felt one last man bottom out and unload inside, just as his head was jerked forward until his nose met coarse hair and his eyes went wide at the abrupt lack of breath. No amount of slamming his fist against the intimidatingly large thigh or muted whimpering could stop the man from emptying down Jason’s throat.

And then came a startled curse. Through a vaguely starry haze, he saw a couple of the crooks shoot to their feet and heard, with a terrible sinking feeling, the words, “Shit, a cop!”

//

Over the years, Dick had been asked a thousand times what it would take for him to break his code. Sometimes it was meant as a taunt, asked by a defeated maniac on the ground, bleeding from a grinning mouth. _“What would it take for you to kill me right now, kid?”_ Other times it was meant in earnest, asked by a concerned friend, hands folded between shivering knees. _“Would you ever do it, Dick? I mean, if you felt you had to?”_

The answer was always a staunch _no._ How could he? Even with their differences in opinion, he and Bruce shared one ideal, and that was never to take someone’s life. Neither the grief of loss nor the insanity of a ballistic rage could provoke him to cross that line. He had sworn.

And then he’d found Jason in that alley, on his knees between those filthy men, and Dick felt in earnest that he’d been lying all these years. The kid’s eyes, big and scared and red from crying, flickered to him when one of the thugs announced his presence, and he felt something inside him go cold. Whatever place he’d dedicated to mercy was just a memory now, broken apart with a sound he hadn’t heard in years—like the snap of a cable coming loose, dropping all the goodness in his life to the ground in a dead heap.

When he slammed the heel of his hand into the closest man’s throat and sent him to his knees wheezing out flecks of blood, he felt nothing: No remorse, no warning bells telling him to stop. His blazing eyes must have translated his feelings well enough, because when he tilted his face back up at the men, all of theirs widened in dawning horror. Good, Dick thought, catching one by the shirt and slamming him so hard into the brick wall that his eyes swirled in his skull. The rest of them went running, scattering like cowardly roaches. All except one, who had his arm hooked around Jason’s throat and a gun to his head. Dick wouldn’t call him brave. Stupid, more like it. Without flinching, he reared his arm back and struck the man hanging from his fist, hard enough to knock him out, and let him crumple pathetically to the ground. “You got a death wish?” he asked the last crook standing.

When he turned, he could see the guy wasn’t intimidated. “What, can’t a man enjoy a good street-side whore every once in a while?” Pointedly, he burrowed the barrel of his PPK into the skin of Jason’s temple, making him whimper. “Cute little thing wandering around out here all alone, dressed like he was? What’d you expect? You should’ve done a better job looking out for him, is all I’m sayin’.”

Dick gritted his teeth so hard he thought he heard something crack. It was hard to tell past the blood rushing in his ears. “I’ll give you one last chance to put the gun down.”

The thug barked a laugh. “Don’t be jealous, I’ll share him with you. He’s a really good lay. Takes it crying and screaming, just like a good bitch should.”

Dick hardly remembered moving, but when he opened his eyes next he had one hand clamped around the man’s wrist and the other around his neck. Idiot had dropped the gun, which was good, but was still glaring at him, which was not. “You mad, angel? Wait’ll I tell you how sweet he looked when he begged my buddy not to put it in. Telling us how he’d _never_ , how he’d been _saving_ it. Y’know, someone special, all that nonsense. Now, that someone wouldn’t be you, would it? Is that why you’re angry? Because my men and I beat you to it?”

Dick’s hand was curled into a fist, but he didn’t know why it wouldn’t move. It just stayed there, frozen in mid-air, inches away from the bastard’s face. It trembled.

The man gave an unfriendly snort and wrapped his own fists into the front of Dick’s shirt, hefting him up to his level to look him straight in the eye. When he spoke, his breath ghosted uncomfortably across Dick’s face. “Sorry we ruined your blushing bride. If it’s any consolation, we loosened him up for you. Not very fun the first go-around with a tight ass like that. But don’t worry, he’s four up and you’ll have a _lot_ more fun that way.”

That did it. Dick squeezed both hands around his throat, forcing his head back against the brick. His thumbs pressed so hard he could hear cracking, and the man’s eyes went huge. The hands that had previously been twisted in the front of his button-down were now scratching at Dick’s own, uselessly trying to pry them off his collapsing windpipe.

Then he heard a weak “Stop it,” from behind him. He looked over his shoulder at Jason, who was huddled on the concrete, clutching his arms with a grip that was all nails. He’d managed to pull his shorts back on to cover himself, but his shirt still hung in tatters around his shoulders.

Dick gave the brutish criminal one last glare before securing him with all the necessary tools and buzzing the police. Blüdhaven cops might be crooked, but at least they’d do something with him for the night, and he could say that Officer Grayson put the fear of God in him. If not, he’d come back, just like he’d do with the rest of them. He was capable of it, too, since their ugly mugs were all burned into his brain, every little detail memorized, down to the pores.

Oh, he would find them, all right. And he would make them _suffer._

For now, he knelt down and shrugged his jacket off his shoulders so he could hand it to Jason, who accepted it wordlessly. Any other time, Dick might have been concerned with the acquiescence to being helped. More expectedly, Jason ignored his outstretched hand and stood on his own, even if his knees buckled and he had to grasp wildly at Dick’s shoulder before he made it all the way up.

“Come on, Little Wing,” he offered in his best soothing voice. With how shaken it was, it didn’t quite have the desired effect. “Let’s get you home.”


	2. Chapter 2

The hustle and bustle inside the department had been predictably manic, weekday or not. As it was often said of Gotham, crime never slept in Blüdhaven, either. Chief liked to make that point as often as he could, which was why, when he had stepped into Dick’s sector, full of raised sections of desks cluttered with unfinished paperwork and old coffee cups, no one was surprised when he intoned, “Alert for Banks Street.”

Dick remembered Dawn sighing listlessly, and it took more time than it should have for her to roll her chair out from behind the shield of her cubicle wall. “Another drug bust?”

“Witness reported a sexual assault in progress.”

Dick’s heart rate picked up. He shot to his feet at the same time Dawn did. “Sexual assault?” the latter cried, and then continued with the exact words in her partner’s head, which were, “ _In progress?_ ” When the chief only gave her a look, Dick gritted his teeth. Dawn appeared to be doing the same. “Do we need backup?”

Time seemed to slow when their superior’s mouth moved around the words, “Two’s enough. Get the boy, get out.” Too many precious seconds were wasted for the sentence to fully process in Dick’s head, and for the instinctive curl of uneasiness in his gut to bloom into full-blown panic.

“A kid?” he asked, mouth dry. He didn’t like any of this to begin with, least of all with his mind on…

“Affirmative. Caucasian, ‘bout five-foot, black hair. ‘S’all there in the report if you—”

The rest of the sentence whizzed right by, because Dick didn’t even pause to grab his jacket or wait for Dawn to follow him before taking off, shoving his way through the B.P.D.’s double doors to the sounds of his superior officers shouting for him to wait. He didn’t, not even when Dawn jogged outside to flag him down. He got in the cruiser, slammed the door, and ripped out of the driveway without looking back.

//

Jason didn’t say a word the entire drive back to the apartment. Dick expected as much, but what he didn’t expect was to find himself equally as silent, with no proper ways of engaging that didn’t sound probing or pitying. Knowing both options would be rightfully hated, he stuck to not speaking at all.

Silence in the car was one thing, silence in the house another. Without being able to help, Dick felt wholly useless, considering how he’d failed his job as a protector when he brought Jason to Blüdhaven and failed again as a source of comfort. The guilt was eating him alive every second he stood there, arms crossed over his chest, blood spatters on his sleeves.

For a few seconds, Jason looked like he was going to say something, but the window of time his eyes weren’t glazed over was horribly short, and, instead, he turned and made his way to the bathroom, shutting himself inside with the gentle click of a lock. When Dick heard the bath water begin to run, he let out a breath he hadn’t realized he’d been holding and scrubbed dirtied fingers through his hair.

His phone dinged with a temporary distraction in the form of a text from Dawn, asking where he’d taken the cruiser and when he intended on bringing it back. There was more, effected through a large paragraph of colorful reprimands, but he ignored it all in favor of tapping her contact and lifting the phone to his ear.

Not a moment after the first ring, Dawn’s voice cawed through the line, not so much with disdain as it was panic when Dick was treated to a loud: “Where on earth are you!”

“Home,” he said, and was met with more incredulous hollering.

“Home!” Dawn repeated, “Why on earth are you home?”

Without thinking about it, as with many things he’d done tonight, Dick snapped back, “I’ll give you a second to make an educated guess, detective.” He had _told_ her he brought Jason to the city. She’d even talked him through his anxieties that Jason would be hurt, but it was obvious neither of them anticipated something so brutal, so damaging. Nothing like _this._

Silence. A slow, purposeful swallow, and then: “Oh, god, is he…”

“He’s here with me. I wouldn’t say he’s doing well by any means.” He paused, glanced over his shoulder to ensure the bath was still running and that he couldn’t be heard, and added, “Listen, can you get me in good with the boss if I skip out for the rest of today? I don’t think I—”

“Of course,” Dawn interrupted with such a soft, sad tone that Dick regretting being cross with her. “Just—just take care of him, okay? Did you catch them?”

“Only two.” It was spoken with a whirl of nausea, to remember how he’d failed on even the simplest front of apprehending the crooks and putting them where they belonged. He vowed that it was a task for another day. Not now, not when Jason needed him.

“There were more than…?”

“I’ll text details,” he said, briskly, as the tap stopped running with two telltale squeaks of his ancient faucet handles. “Thank you for understanding.”

He stood stark-still in the new silence of the apartment, first to stare at nothing, and then, eventually, to give as comprehensive a profile as he could to Dawn. She’d run them through the database. Whether she got a hit or not, the remaining perpetrators wouldn’t be difficult to track, since Dick had seen the tattoos they wore, poorly-concealed beneath the rolled-up sleeves of their battered tops. They were gangsters through-and-through, and this side of town only had two parties who were worthy of mention, which is precisely where any competent officer would begin.

Neither the optimistic chances of arrest nor the orange daylight filtering through the slatted blinds could make him feel anything other than empty. And if he felt that way, how could he possibly fathom how Jason felt? How could he help what couldn’t be changed?

He wasn’t sure what possessed him to take a step toward the bathroom, but once he’d begun, some unstoppable force led him onward, until his knuckles were poised to knock. Instead, he opted for a less jarring call of Jason’s name.

To his surprise, he heard a soft, “Come in.”

Despite analyzing every possibility of what he’d see, he couldn’t help but crumble at the way Jason sat, hugging his knees, in only a sad few inches of pink-tinted water. When he looked up, there were fresh tear tracks down his ruddy cheeks, and absolutely nothing on planet earth or elsewhere could have stopped Dick from shutting the door behind him with a _click_ and kneeling next to the tub to wrap his arms around the kid’s shoulders. The hug wasn’t returned, but he felt like this part was for himself—a greedy and selfish thing, but something he needed to ground himself and to breathe again without shaking.

Tentatively, Jason croaked, “It hurts.” Dick felt more than saw the way his shoulders drooped with complete resignation, and then trembled with the effort of holding back sobs.

It was stupid to kick his shoes off and climb over the lip of the tub, but he did anyway. He knelt straight into the water and pressed Jason’s shoulder to urge him back, just enough to peel his thighs from his chest and to whisper, “Let me see.” Even more stupid was to demand anything of Jason in this state, but he obeyed regardless, straightening his legs until thin calves slid into place between Dick’s own, still dressed in his now-soaked slacks.

There were so many bruises left behind, shaped like fingerprints and pressed violently into tender areas. Scrapes that still smelled like the coppery tang of blood. Bite marks that made Dick swallow hard.

Silently, he eased the tap on to barely more than a trickle, grabbing the set-aside wash cloth to warm it in the water before dragging it gingerly across the first of the wounds. Jason flinched but didn’t object.

While Dick worked, Jason had begun crying softly. Letting himself be cleaned like this was a display of vulnerability—of brokenness in his own eyes—that no doubt set him on edge. Even on a good day, he wasn’t keen on being coddled, and the small, hiccup-y sounds were so unlike the boy Dick knew that every single one was like a knife to the heart.

With temerity he didn’t have but could reasonably fake, he tapped Jason’s knee.

Wordlessly, achingly obediently, Jason spread his thighs, and the two of them shifted so that Dick could kneel between them. He wished he could have said something helpful or calming when the cloth skimmed over the streaks of dried ejaculate and blood lining the inner parts of his thighs, but Jason reached up and curled his fingers around Dick’s shoulders to steady himself, and so he counted it as the smallest blessing that he was being allowed to help. Allowed to be useful, even in such an intimate way.

Every gentle slosh of water lifted more blood from below, and with it the blood in Dick’s veins spiked. He was going to kill those men. He was going to—no, no he wouldn’t. However hard it was to remind himself not to cross that line, he knew it wasn’t what he needed. More importantly, wasn’t what _Jason_ needed.

His expression must have relayed as much, because Jason intercepted his work by resting his forehead on Dick’s shoulder, and asked in a quiet, scratchy voice, “How did you find me?”

It seemed impossible, but when he responded, his own voice came out even quieter, hardly a whisper. “Someone reported it.”

“They saw me and didn’t do anything to stop it?”

Dick paused, swallowed hard. Parsed his thoughts carefully. “They probably weren’t equipped to deal with it. That was the best they could do.”

Jason offered a noncommittal sound, which Dick erroneously took to mean the conversation was over. He’d just begun to rise from the water when hands hooked tighter around his shoulders, holding him in place. Slowly, Jason lifted his head, and the way his eyes flickered meaningfully up the length of Dick’s face before settling on his eyes set off alarms in his head before anything was ever spoken aloud.

“I was going to wait for you,” Jason said, then flinched like he regretted the words the moment they were out.

Dick wished more than anything he had just shrugged it off. He wished he didn’t always have to be an impulsive ass who strove to cross boundaries and to flip everyone’s world upside down, all for the sake of pleasing his own gnawing curiosity. Instead, he asked, “This isn’t about your promise to wait at the house, is it?”

Jason closed his eyes and let his fingers slip from Dick’s shoulders. His brow furrowed in the exact way it always did when he was confronted with a tough feeling, and the idea that Dick had brought that on, in the midst of all the kid’s pain, made him ache. Softly, Jason answered, “No.”

Dick swallowed hard, nodded once. Looked at the tub wall and focused on the gleam of white and nothing else. He hadn’t known before today that Jason ever looked at him that way, and he didn’t want what had happened to be the reason he was finding out. It stung to think of all the chances where Dick could have said something. The truth, even, might have mitigated this crisis. Logically he knew it wasn’t something that could have been prevented, but emotionally the toll weighed heavy.

Slowly, he stood, and this time Jason let him go. For the second time in as many minutes, Dick regretted asking. He could have (should have) let the statement pass. Knew it could have been taken innocently, and not like the intense confession it actually was. Even if Jason would have known he was lying, it would have been easier to stomach the forlorn way he was looked at as he exited the bath, slacks dripping onto the tile beneath his feet.

On unsteady fawn legs, Jason rose as well, and while he dried himself, Dick took the opportunity to glance back over, watch the rest of the pink water swirl down the drain with a cold feeling in his gut. There were countless words floating through his brain waiting to be spoken, but none of them made sense. The jumble was just alphabet soup to him.

In lieu of words, he popped open the medicine cabinet above the sink and pulled out two tubes. Finally, while he deliberated over them, his brain allowed him the barest bit of clarity to demand, in a whisper, “Sit.”

Jason obeyed, easing himself down onto the lid of the toilet and flinching as he did. Dick watched the towel pool around his thin hips and decidedly averted his gaze down to Jason’s knees, scratched raw and bloody.

Nothing intercepted their silence except for the slight sounds of Dick unscrewing the cap to one tube. No conversation. Only bated breath, which Dick was dismayed to find was as much a product of his own nerves as it was of Jason’s. Because of it, the air around them seemed to grow more tense as he pumped the ointment onto his thumb and dabbed gently at the worst spots. Jason didn’t so much as wince; he had no reason to, with injuries so minor. Really, it was the only calming thing of the day. It was familiar, even if Dick was weighed down with how they both exhaled softly when it was done, and why that was.

He recapped the tube and stored it back in the cabinet. During his search for bandages, he could feel Jason’s eyes on him, beseeching and curious. He considered that to be better than distant. Better than lifeless. It took a considerable amount of willpower and a preemptive swallow of anxiety before he could say, “The other tube on the counter is for numbing.”

He didn’t dare explain further, as the way Jason closed his eyes and set his mouth into a tighter line said he understood. When Dick knelt back in front of him, Jason’s knees spread further apart, as if to invite him between them, and carefully, with a brief thought to what it might mean for his character, Dick accepted the position and leaned in. Too close. Far too close. Jason was holding his breath again, looking down at him so reverently that Dick wished he was someone deserving of it.

The silence from before pervaded while he smoothed a hand up the back of one calf and held it while he pressed the large square over the knee. It wasn’t a necessity so much as a way to bust the walls down further. He knew he shouldn’t be touching just to touch. He knew it was despicable.

Still, he moved on to the other leg, and when he finished flattening the bandage against Jason’s knee, he leaned in and pressed a kiss to Jason’s chest, where his heart fluttered wildly, audibly against his ribcage. When he offered an emphatic, “I’m sorry,” Jason seemed to remember how to breathe again.

He asked, so painfully earnest, “What for?”

Dick considered his list of sins with a grim frown. “Everything,” he returned. “For failing to protect you. For how violent I was.” When he paused, he was surprised to feel Jason’s fingers touch his chin, and the mere startling alone would have made him lift his head, even if that hadn’t been the boy’s intent. The eyes that looked back at him were far from broken, but he was afraid of what was in them nonetheless. Another hard swallow on his part, and then, “For making you feel things you shouldn’t.”

Dick hated how Jason sucked in a breath through his teeth, looking down at him so anxiously when he asked, “Do you feel them too?” More than that, he hated the way his own lips suddenly felt so dry and how every thought in his head cursed his name when he nodded back.

“I’m sorry,” he repeated.

“They burnt me,” Jason said.

Dick’s brows shot toward his hairline. “They burnt you?”

He hadn’t realized he would be stepping out of the frying pan and into the fire with his instinctive response, but that must have been what Jason was counting on when he twisted around on the seat and pressed his fingers down into the towel bunched at his hips. It flattened with the motion of his hands, sliding out from around him until it curtained the toilet base and left his back exposed down to where he sat. Sure enough, down beneath his dimples, resting on the cleft, was an angry pink circle, indicative of a cigarette burn.

Seeing it brought all of Dick’s fury from before back to him in a wave, and if Jason sensed the shift in mood, he didn’t react. His only response, the one that gave him away, was an involuntary spread of goosebumps along chilled flesh.

Dick rose, and Jason faced forward again, leaving himself bared with no hint of hesitation nor of shame as he watched his caretaker pop open the medicine cabinet one last time.

“Here,” Dick said meaningfully, tossing over another tube. “Burn cream. You won’t need a lot.”

Hardly a second later, his phone buzzed insistently in his pocket, denoting a string of messages from Dawn that no doubt meant she’d located their remaining crooks. He knew he should take care of it, and that it was more urgent than anything else he’d need to attend to, but that was before Jason chewed his lip in thought and said, “I’d like your help, if you’re not too busy.”

It was carefully phrased as a statement rather than a request, leaving the option for Dick to go about his day as well as saving Jason the embarrassment of outright asking, but it didn’t feel right to ignore something so seemingly soul-baring, and so Dick took the medicine back without a word. While he unscrewed the cap, Jason’s hand lingered a little too long on his own; Dick let it.

“I’m never too busy for you,” he admitted, smoothing a careful hand over Jason’s hair before leaning in again, resting their foreheads together. Jason’s breath hitched, and he dropped Dick’s gaze for just a handful of seconds to watch the way his Adam’s apple bobbed apprehensively in his throat. “I should have gotten there sooner. I should’ve—”

More brazen this time, Jason’s hands lifted to Dick’s shoulders and squeezed. Instead of what he expected, Jason’s response to Dick’s personal shortcomings was a simple, “Let’s not talk about it yet.”

Dick nodded mutely, pulling back and pumping a small amount of ointment onto his index finger. Jason took the hint and turned back around, arms crossed on the commode, his chin atop them. Like this, Dick couldn’t help but count Jason’s scars, wondering all the while how many more this experience had forced upon him. Physically? Perhaps none. But emotionally?

Jason was strong, but that didn’t take the bitter taste out of Dick’s mouth any more than the soft whining sounds the kid made when the cold ointment spread liberally across the tiny, circular burn. He rubbed at it maybe a little longer than he should have, but the only thing he was given in response was a weak, almost _needy_ whisper of his name that made his jaw tighten. “I’m here,” he said.

“I know,” Jason replied, voice a little rough. “Thank you.”

“I have to take the car back to the station. Will you be all right here on your own?”

Jason nodded to the affirmative, which Dick took as his cue to step away, scrubbing the last of the residue from his finger with a weathered hand towel while he stared at Jason’s back. The kid didn’t move or speak, and Dick didn’t press him. Despite the growing tenseness at the lack of words, Dick ignored the feelings tugging at him, begging to be known, and left the room, shutting the door behind him as he did.

It was no less difficult to leave the house, even though he checked every window lock on the way out and secured the door to the best of his abilities.

Out on the streets, the guilt and anguish roiling in him gave way to blind fury, taking him all the way to the B.P.D. on four wheels turning well past the speed limits. Stepping through those doors again felt like a fresh kind of hell, if only because he had to look from his partner’s worried face to the two ugly mugs of the remaining crooks he hadn’t caught from the alley. The scowls they wore made something inside him burn hotter than before, even though he thought there was no way he could get any angrier.

Despite himself, he maintained a level voice. “I don’t suppose you were waiting for me to take these guys back, eh, Dawn?”

Dawn, bless her, cocked a brow as she looked the other way both literally and figuratively. “That would be irresponsible of me, wouldn’t it? Leaving you alone with two child molesters?”

Between the two men, one of them snapped his head up, eyes wide and manic. “You can’t say that around here, lady! Are you crazy? You’ll get us _killed!_ ”

Dick hefted the coward to his feet and looked him in the eye with a grin he hoped was as vindictive as it felt. “When I’m done beating the living daylights out of you, you’re gonna _wish_ you were dead, buddy.”

And, sure, maybe he was overdoing it, but once he corralled the men into their holding cells and let the first punches fly, he couldn’t rightfully say that it wasn’t the greatest damn thing he’d ever felt in his life.

//

The moment Jason heard the front door close, he crept out of the bathroom and into Dick’s bedroom, scouring the mess of laundry piled in one corner for a shirt he could conceivably pull over himself for comfort. It didn’t take much doing for him to find the right one, and the instant cool cotton grazed his skin he crawled straight into the mussed sheets of the man’s bed and waited for tears that never came.

It wasn’t as if the pain had stopped, but something along the way had taken the ability to cry right from his eyes, as if he were too soothed by the familiar scent around him. _Perfect._

He was counting the minutes before Dick would be home so that he could escape before he was caught, but it grew harder and harder the longer he tried not to imagine Dick’s hands on him, touching with a kind of gentleness that took a bit of the sting from his wounds. The healing wasn’t over, not by a long shot, but—

But Jason ached bone-deep for something more concrete, despite everything, despite the things in him screaming not to fist a hand around himself and keen into the pillows. It was wrong, but as he peered up at the alarm clock with half-lidded eyes and glimpsed the passing of another minute, he couldn’t think of any reason he shouldn’t treat himself to something _good._ Something like those big, careful hands holding him like he was holding himself, t-shirt jammed between his teeth now to keep the sounds from spilling out and ruining his fantasy.

He powered through the stinging and the soreness—harder still, the guilt—just to imagine how good it would feel to have Dick’s mouth around him, inside him, kissing him with the taste of Jason still lingering on his lips. It made his head spin, and for a long while all he could coherently think was how badly he needed this, how it erased the shame of losing, of being _hurt._

Dick would never hurt him. They’ve sparred and argued and still, Jason couldn’t remember a time where he was completely at the man’s mercy. He _wanted_ to be; wondered what it would be like to let go and feel without being torn apart, humiliated.

A complicated mix of emotions stirred through him, some of them hitting receptors that made a groan fight its way up his throat, while others ignited his shame until he was hot all over. He couldn’t stop, didn’t want to stop, and at the mental image of Dick swallowing him down to the base—just to take care of him, to coax out whatever jumbled praises Jason was capable of—he came all over his fist and into the sheets with a somewhat warbled litany of yeses.

He didn’t realize he’d finally shed tears until he collapsed face-first into the damp pillow with a soft moan after the fact. Even though he knew the smart thing would be to clean up and hide all evidence, he couldn’t stop the small but dominating part of his brain that desperately craved just a couple more minutes of relaxation. After today, he didn’t think he’d ever feel so boneless and comfortable, and if it weren’t for the insistent pain blooming inside him at every shift of muscle, he might have drooled.

Still, it came as a surprise when he closed his eyes for just a second longer, only to have them shoot open at the sound of the front door unlocking and swinging open.

Frantically, he picked himself up and cast a wild look at the alarm clock, reading nearly an hour past when he’d apparently dozed off. He heard Dick’s voice calling his name, but instead of scrambling to his feet to discard the mess, he simply sat there, stunned, when the doorknob finally turned.

Dick didn’t look surprised. The sound he made is relieved, fond, and the soft smile on his face made Jason’s head spin more than before.

“I’m sorry,” Dick said, like he’d discovered him doing something endearing, “I should have knocked.”

For the first time since what had happened, Jason smiled, even it was a bashful thing set in the beet-red of his face. “I didn’t mean to…” He paused, unsure of what to say. Didn’t mean to think of that pretty smile between his legs, healing him like only Dick could? The only one Jason would ever trust with that, especially now. His guilt coasted alongside his weariness, but he found with a somewhat incriminating swallow of nerves that that’s not exactly what he was sorry for. Finally, just as Dick’s brows knitted together in concern, Jason finished with, “I didn’t mean to ruin your sheets.” He glanced down, flinched at the unbecoming streaks on the front of his borrowed shirt, and added, “Or your clothes.”

There wasn’t a response for so long that he felt the need to clear his throat and pull his knees in closer to his chest. When his gaze lowered, it was to follow the movement in the way Dick closed the door behind him, his knuckles scraped and bruised worse than they’d been earlier. Jason’s brows rose as he pieced together why Dick had taken so long to return the car to the station.

Always there to protect him. To heal him.

He let his legs flatten again, slipping them beneath the covers and watching as Dick crossed the carpeted distance between them. This time when he knelt and leaned his forehead against Jason’s, the latter blearily pressed into a desperate kiss, lips hungry and searching, and in all his tired fantasies he’d never anticipated how comfortable and right it felt to be kissed back. Carefully and gently, with all the consideration for him that Jason always knew Dick would show.

It might only be the beginning of the long road to healing, but he was glad for the skittering of his heartbeat when they parted and for the way Dick looked at him like something worth all the money in the world. It meant he was _alive,_ and that was much easier to digest with the heavy, warm weight of someone he trusted sliding into bed beside him.

“I’m glad I don’t have to heal alone,” he admitted, quietly, into the crook of Dick’s neck. It didn’t take long after that for him to lose all ability to keep his eyes open, but he wasn’t afraid that Dick would disappear like a mirage, and at least he would have someone there when he woke up tomorrow and had to face a new day as bravely as he could.

Distantly, he heard Dick murmur into his hair something including the words, “Never alone,” and Jason took it to heart with a yawn and a faint, “I love you,” that he’d deal with speaking aloud some other time.

His dreams hit with a kind of all-encompassing warmth, but he caught, on the tail end of consciousness, something not unlike: “—too, Little Wing.”

Handily enough, it lulled him right to sleep.


End file.
